++ THE PATH OF THE BEAST ++

• Path of the Beast Supplicants art by Mike Franchina

The Path of the Beast is the ruin of humanity

We shed the veneer of civilization like winter antlers

We will slake our thirsts, and bury our teeth in the entrails of the weak.

There is no enlightenment, only strength

There is no hope, only hunger.

Psalm 17 of the Revelations of the Beast

The Beast has always been there. Kingdoms rise and topple, but the Beast remains. It was there before man came to the wild places, and it is said that it will be there long after they are gone. In the ages when men prostrated themselves before graven images, they trembled before the Beast. From the goat-headed fomorians of Éire and werewolves of Livonia, to rākṣasa of India, the darkest tales of mankind tell of half-beasts with an unnatural craving for human flesh. But time ebbed and flowed, and the servants of the Beast retreated before the march of civilization.

As the world embraced the words of the Prophets and the light of Salvation, writing laws in tablets of stone and holy books, the Path of the Beast lay hidden in the trackless wilds of the world. The Path was kept alive in the memory of those ancient ways and in the Revelations that had prophesied the return of the Beast from both land and the sea. Long did the memory of the dark cult lie dormant at the edge of nightmares, slumbering in sleepless sleep, kept alive only in eroded idols brought from beyond the stars that dimmed aeons ago.

Then the Hellgate was opened in 1099, and the Beast stirred from its slumber. Awake once more, it found the world overrun with the hated children of YHWH and shackled with rules, law, order and morality. But with the Hellmouth spewing its unholy fumes that spread across the world, it swung the balance of power in favour of the Beast. Remnants of its children, though few in number, prowled from their hiding places to enact a great and powerful plan. They were to go forth and multiply, and their new adherents would come from the ranks of the Children of God.

Finding converts proved far easier than one might think. The Beast found that not all humans were well-suited to withstand the grinding pressure and deprivation of the Great War. Grief for lost loved ones and unrelenting fear were ever-present to most people. Veterans returned from the front crippled in mind and body, haunted by the terrors of warfare. Alcohol and opiates offered only a brief respite to those who sought their aid. Hunger and poverty under the heavy burden of war taxes sapped many a will to live. In their hearts a great many wished they could forget their troubles altogether and live a life without fear. So when the moon grew fat the hymns of the feral nymphs could be heard, their siren songs luring many to forbidding forests and desolate mountains where the children of the Beast awaited them. None is truly immune to the seductive call of the Beast. There is always a seed of doubt, in even the most stalwart mind.

When the men and women came as sleepwalkers to the idols of the Beast, they found themselves surrounded by feral gleaming eyes in the dark, and sibilant whispers offering them a choice. Unlike Beelzebub’s Black Grail which takes its victims by force, or the yoke of slavery of the Court, the Beast wants mortals to willingly renounce their claim of being the image of God, and turn their backs on the promise of Salvation.

And many willingly knelt before the altars of the Beast to become Supplicants, the lowliest of the followers of the Path. Once accepted, there is no turning back. This then, is the Path of the Beast: the unravelling of the cohesion of their bodies and loss of divine inheritance. Freed from the shackles of laws, and with morals thrown aside, replaced by howling and killing and revelling in joy, the great gift of the Beast to its followers is the bliss of oblivion. All past anguish and shame is lost, replaced by the wild thrill of the hunt. The cost is to be beyond salvation and be both the hunter and the hunted: to wage feral war against order and laws of both men and God.

Each Supplicant, no matter how high or low, is marked by Bestial Runes carved on their naked skin with obsidian knives during the revelries of the Beast as they are initiated to the Path. When the packs of the Path gather together, these symbols burn and bleed, reacting to the presence of different runes, bringing forth great and terrible hidden powers within them. A clever pack leader knows how to organise its followers so that they may gain the most suitable dark blessing to be called forth in battle, combining the Runes to form words of power.

Each fork of the Path leads the Supplicant to a different end. Most become half-bestial creatures, their will insufficient to take them all the way into full beasthood.They are half-breeds with beasts heads and claws emerging from their flesh, which they shed as a wolf sheds its coat. They are plagued by the monstrous parasites of the Path that fill them with the transformative blood of the Beast. They form into great hunting packs, using both human weapons as well as their claws and teeth as they fall upon those who strive to maintain order.

Some advance further on the Path through acts of feral frenzy and are able to capture an essence of the Beast - a mighty wolf or venomous snake, a great horned goat or another powerful carnivore. Around these great predators the lesser creatures of the Path gather and in an orgasmic rush of violence they assault the forces of Order. Remote hamlets and isolated villages are often targeted by the packs of the Beast.

Once the Path grows strong enough in its area, it no longer hides - instead, it goes to war. Its power waxes great during appointed times, and especially when the moon casts its spell over the world. But not all areas where the Path hunts are in the wilds - No Man’s Land is teeming with the horrors of the Path who hunt humans for food, for sport, and for the glory of the Beast.

Packs of the Path are led by Horned Priests, ancient ones who have followed the Path for many centuries, devolving ever further from humanity while still retaining an outer form that can fool most observers. They are known for great cunning and twisted wisdom, able to match even the generals of New Antioch and Pashas of the Sultanate in planning. Their acumen for the mastery of tactics and strategies has given rise to disturbing rumours that another race, much like man but of deeper and subtler wisdom, once roamed the earth before Adam and Eve were banished from the Garden. Priests claim that they have walked the Path of the Beast beyond the veil where creation began and discovered the wisdom and glory denied to mortals - mortals who are doomed to grovel and pray to an uncaring God.